


The Tragedie of Attack on Titan: Chapter 61, Act I-II

by Burdenedwithgloriousporpoise



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Canon Compliant, Chapter Related, Gen, Iambic Pentameter, Manga Spoilers, Shakespearean Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-02
Updated: 2016-12-02
Packaged: 2018-09-06 02:14:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8730856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Burdenedwithgloriousporpoise/pseuds/Burdenedwithgloriousporpoise
Summary: Our scene is set in inner Sina, whereBefore the king and nobles court convenesto hear the Survey Corps' commander givedefense for his troops and their right to live.A gallows overshadows Erwin's plea;within the balance hangs humanity.





	

_ACT I. SCENE I._

_Sina. A street outside the courthouse. A gallows is being erected._

_[Enter CITIZENS 1 AND 2.]_

  
Citizen 1:

Wherefore comes this clamor? What a dreadful stir!

 

Citizen 2:

Hast thou not heard? The Survey Corps's fate is judged within. Rumor says 'twill be disbanded, and their commander set to swing.

 

Citizen 1:

Commander Erwin Smith?

 

Citizen 2:

The same. Good riddance, I say; a murderer in hero's garb, spending blood and money both on chasing fantasies. Enough youths have by his command been thrust to fruitless doom. Let him hang!

 

Citizen 1:

Methinks he is a gallant soldier, la.

 

Citizen 2:

Gallant perhaps, but to his own design.  
A useless virtue in our present time.

 

Citizen 1:

Aye, a shame. Though I am loath to see the end of such a one,  
perhaps this evil is in justice done.

 

_SCENE II._

  
_The same. Within the courthouse. ERWIN SMITH kneels bound before the KING and NOBLES, mounting a final plea. With him are DOT PIXIS and NILE DOK._

 

Erwin:

Would ye forsake a spear for passive shield  
While mass our enemies outside the wall?  
Nay, timid sentiments will so unleash  
A plague of desolation on our heads  
As shall reduce the whole of man to dust.  
Consider now the heavy stroke of doom  
Impending if our fragile shell be cracked.  
If Titan breach should overtake wall Rose  
The screaming masses panic-struck shall fall  
Upon the strained haven of thy gates.  
'Tis well-known that these resources are scant  
And in the terror and the starving plight  
Two factions formed by base necessity  
Would in a bloody clash of arms give fight.  
Our enemies no longer dwell outside;  
By our own hands will all of us have died.

 

Noble 1:

And thou dost think that through the Survey Corps  
Is found deliverance from such a war.

 

Erwin:

Aye.  
If by our efforts this fight's to be won  
It must be ended 'fore it has begun.  
Or am I wrong, and do you nobles hold  
Within thy gold-bound brows a plan as such  
Will render up the war into our hands?

 

Noble 1:

Thy position remains exceeding clear;  
That the innocence of you and your Corps  
Prevails in spite of treasonous war.  
Our victory comes only by thy men.  
That thou dost lie is plain enough, and now  
A murder hath ta'en place that doth attest  
Against the peace thy thought runs counter-course.  
Your murd'rous general's crimson blades are proved  
More truthful than a thousand of thy words.  
A garrison lies dead at thy command.  
The blood that stains the pavements of Stohess  
Cries loud with accusation of your crimes.  
This shameful act doth trigger righteous war.  
Thine own lips preached to take preemptive strike;  
We so condemn thee and thy corps to death.

 

Noble 2:

Pixis--  
Doth your relationship with th' accus'd  
Provide us goodly reason to believe  
The views held by this dissentious rogue  
Have taken in thy allegiance as well?

 

Pixis:

Nay.  
When touched to brittle crop the smallest spark  
Will set alight so destructive a blaze  
To raze whole fields into the scorched earth.  
Sword on sword of fellow man shall bring  
Naught but calamity and suffering.  
Enacting Erwin's plan will sure condemn  
the dwellers of the walls to certain end.

 

Noble 2:

Forgive my brusque demeanor, good Pixis.

 

Noble 1:

Our attitude and viewpoint is as one.  
Erwin, thy defense stands in ruined shame.  
Your crimes shall see thee hang; thy men, the same.

 

Noble 2:

Bear him hence.

  
_[They begin to drag him to the door. Enter ANKA, terrified and out of breath]_

  
Anka:

My heart doth shake with news of grievous woe!  
The walls are breached--tonight we'll sleep below!  
The armored and colossal titans both  
have laid waste to the Stohess gates and now  
terror-stricken masses this way come!

 

Pixis:

Secure the escape routes!  
To the eastern district shall we send  
Our front-line forces, dispatch'd with all haste!  
The evacuees must be protected!

 

Noble 1:

No, and belay!  
Seal all gates and let no refugees in!

 

Nile Dok:

What?  
Shall we stand by as half our own are lost?

 

Noble 1:

Erwin spoke in truth;  
Our open gates would fill with hungry mouths  
and bring a deadly war upon our heads.  
We would be fools to offer food and bed  
to swelling ranks of ones who want us dead!

 

Nile Dok:

How now? How now?  
Such a situation was conjecture!

 

Noble 1:

A conjecture that bears all likelihood.  
Now we, foundation of humankind's throne  
reiterate our orders. Get you hence!  
_[Aside]_  
'Tis rotten luck that such would happen now,  
but such ill tides should dampen not our thoughts.  
Our trusty servant soon will have obtained  
the final piece to make our rule complete.

 

Commander:

Away, ye rogues, heard not your masters' will?

 

Nile:

The sealing of the gates?

 

Soldier 1:

Aye.

 

Nile:

Fie!  
For Wall Rose' sake I turn my back and say  
our gates stay ope; the king's orders belay!

 

Soldier 1:

What? Commit thou treason?

 

Nile:

Yea.

 

_[Enter ZACKLY, and the MILITARY POLICE]_

 

Zackly:

I as well.

  
Pixis:

Commander-in-Chief Zackly, thou art welcome.  
Art thou surprised by the lords' response?

  
Zackly:

Nay.  
All, calm thy fever'd looks.  
The report thou hast heard is but a lie;  
But one that has from falsehood grown a crop  
of truth enough to glean a harvest great.

 

Noble 1:

How now, ye rogue?

 

Pixis:

'Twas my doing, lord, and thou shalt find  
The soldiers that attended to your grace  
have taken station at some far off place--  
a stroke of luck indeed, for one of us.

 

Noble 1:

What sayest thou, villian? Sayest thou what, knave?

 

Pixis:

We here have made a gamble with our lives,  
and put our fates into thy royal hands.  
If thou had passed the test were were prepared  
to offer up confession of our crimes  
and in ignominy accept our ends.  
However, this sacrifice depended  
on thee thyselves to prove thy character.  
If all ye knew of courage was the lack,  
if avarice in surfeit swell o'erflowed,  
if thy resolution's store was emptied  
to make a way for twice the share of greed;  
if humanity was but second-rate  
to luxury of brimming dinner-plate;  
then thine own hands have plucked away thy crowns.  
'Tis true we know naught of the titans' pow'r  
nor have knowledge of how we came to be.  
Yet still we dare upset thy reign's silence  
which ye have mistaken for sign of peace.  
Beneath the seeming quiet brews a storm  
and lack of voices speak eloquently.  
We stand in resolution; ye have none.  
Thy command would see humankind undone.

 

Noble 1:

Fool!  
This capitol hath fallen to thy grasp,  
but dost thou think the nobles will agree?  
Thinkest thou they shall with meek acceptance,  
surrender to this kingship's overhaul?  
Nay! Fie!  
Thy half-wit plan hath set in motion death!  
Obscene, clay-brain'd, loathsome rampallians!  
Thinkest thou art heroes? Bah! Thou art naught  
but scullions with daydreams grandiose!  
'Preservation' named thee as thy reason  
and called us mongrels steeped in selfish greed--  
Yet the outworking of thy glorious plot  
Shall be the bringing down of all to naught!

 

Zackly:

And yet I have pause.  
Erwin--look.

 

Erwin:

This is...

 

Zackly:

Within this letter, testimony lies  
of Flegel Reeves--whose father, lords, you know--  
your orders saw him slain, and now the truth  
is proclaim'd throughout the city of Trost.  
The treachery of thy armed forces' crime  
and subsequent blame of the Survey Corps  
has been revealed alongside reports of  
manipulation of the people's press.  
The final blow comes to thee from thine own.  
Two members of thy military core  
have attested the depth of thy perjure.  
This king Fritz hath not rights to hold the throne;  
this fact is now by all the people known.

 

Noble 1:

...Awake, fool!

 

King:

Eh? 'St supper?

 

Noble 1:

Thou useless scoundrel!

 

Nile:

Erwin--  
it seems as though this gamble has played out  
exactly as you hoped; the vict'ry's thine.  
What? Art thou not pleased?

 

Erwin:

The path of mankind hitherto hath run  
along a course precarious, and now--  
to even direr straits doth it turn.  
A razor blade shall be our passage hence,  
and belike loose between the handle slabs  
so by its treach'rous rat'ling cut our soles  
and cast our bodies down in red defeat.  
I fear our future holds much darker things;  
For blood and death mark taking crowns from kings.

**Author's Note:**

> So I marathoned "The Hollow Crown" (Henry VI parts 1&2) for 4 hours and this is what happened.
> 
> I switched in and out of verse in places (like when the citizens were talking in the beginning, and when things were getting chaotic with the escape routes and closing the gates) because verse was the language of the courts, while people ordinarily spoke in prose. Actually, Shakespeare's only play written entirely in verse is Richard II. This made Shakespeare a bit of a controversial figure in his day, as some of his critics saw his writing in the "common people's language" as low-brow!
> 
> I also called it a "Tragedie" because I'm caught up on the manga and HOOOO BOY! #salty4ever


End file.
